TY  - JOUR
A1  - Brüggmann, Dörthe
A1  - Kollascheck, Jana
A1  - Quarcoo, David
A1  - Bendels, Michael Hans Karl
A1  - Klingelhöfer, Doris
A1  - Louwen, Frank
A1  - Jaque, Jenny
A1  - Groneberg, Jan David Alexander
T1  - Ectopic pregnancy : exploration of its global research architecture using density-equalising mapping and socioeconomic benchmarks
T2  - BMJ open
N2  - Objective: About 2% of all pregnancies are complicated by the implantation of the zygote outside the uterine cavity and termed ectopic pregnancy. Whereas a multitude of guidelines exists and related research is constantly growing, no thorough assessment of the global research architecture has been performed yet. Hence, we aim to assess the associated scientific activities in relation to geographical and chronological developments, existing research networks and socioeconomic parameters.
Design: Retrospective, descriptive study.
Setting: On the basis of the NewQIS platform, scientometric methods were combined with novel visualising techniques such as density-equalising mapping to assess the scientific output on ectopic pregnancy. Using the Web of Science, we identified all related entries from 1900 to 2012.
Results: 8040 publications were analysed. The USA and the UK were dominating the field in regard to overall research activity (2612 and 723 publications), overall citation numbers and country-specific H-Indices (US: 80, UK: 42). Comparison to economic power of the most productive countries demonstrated that Israel invested more resources in ectopic pregnancy-related research than other nations (853.41 ectopic pregnancy-specific publications per 1000 billlion US$ gross domestic product (GDP)), followed by the UK (269.97). Relation to the GDP per capita index revealed 49.3 ectopic pregnancy-specific publications per US$1000 GDP per capita for the USA in contrast to 17.31 for the UK. Semiqualitative indices such as country-specific citation rates ranked Switzerland first (24.7 citations per ectopic pregnancy-specific publication), followed by the Scandinavian countries Finland and Sweden. Low-income countries did not exhibit significant research activities.
Conclusions: This is the first in-depth analysis of global ectopic pregnancy research since 1900. It offers unique insights into the global scientific landscape. Besides the USA and the UK, Scandinavian countries and Switzerland can also be regarded as leading nations with regard to their relative socioeconomic input.
KW  - density equalizing mapping
KW  - ectopic pregnancy
KW  - female health
KW  - reproduction biology
Y1  - 2017
UR  - http://publikationen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/46354
UR  - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-463541
SN  - 2044-6055
N1  - This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
VL  - 7
IS  - 10, e018394
SP  - 1
EP  - 12
PB  - BMJ Publishing Group
CY  - London
ER  -